petertheis

here's where the 50mm f1.8 falls down - depth of field is so small that the hairs on your cat's nose are in focus, yet his eyes are not! opening the aperture up does two things: increase the depth of field so eyes are in focus, and sharpens up the entire image as this lens is sharpest at around f2.4.

three things to look at here

a) white balance - I'm not sure if you used awb, but there is a serious blue cast to the image

b) rule of thirds - this would be strong if his eyes were near/close to a key point.  lightly cropping the top and right would help!

c) focus - its hard to tell here, but the focus seems a little off - was this with the 50mm prime?  I've found that I MUST focus on the eyes with this lens. On this point, the old style "focus, reaim, then take picture" method DOES NOT WORK with a 50mm/1.8.  the depth of field is so shallow that everything will go slightly out of focus.  I've found that I still have a hard time breaking this habit...

ON THE PLUS SIDE:

I like the colors and composition (with a little cropping), and the touch of grass along the bottom of the frame is really cool.